„The Moment of Surprise Always Adheres to Creativity. You Get Surprised by Yourself.” Interview with Composer Ludger Bruemmer

Composer Ludger Bruemmer was one of the first of his generation who turned towards digitally produced acoustic-electronic music. He is one of the pioneers of a music genre that is beyond growth and several transformations. Did he know that already when he started? “Artists are always associated with the present. The reception is in the past. This means that art, or what we understand as art, is always art of yesteryear. Artists also live in the present world, so it doesn’t make any sense that they should live fifty years ahead. The only thing is that they stretch further”, he says. There was never a clear defined goal of his journey: “You let yourself go into an open-ended process. The moment of surprise always adheres to creativity. You get surprised by yourself.”

During the interview with Bruemmer it becomes clear, that the aspects of emotionality and sensuousness play a decisive role in his work: “The creative process is not an end in itself and it’s not a purely cognitive activity with contents neither. It is always accompanied by emotions.” Emotions and the question of meaning lead him primarily within his ambition to transport something out into the world. “Sensuousness is a human trait that I stand for. It’s about not doing any art that is divorced from reality, but that we can connect to and ground ourselves in. Creativity is not scary to me, but the purpose of creativity and the question of implementing it is.” Thus it seems that Brümmer strikes an irrational path in order to connect himself to reality. To make sure that it works the clue is the final performance in front of the audience. “This is a privileged situation”, he says. To him it means kind of an esteem, which is fundamentally important for the progress of his work.

In Bruemmer’s opinion this artistic process is not bounded necessarily to music or arts in general. “Creativity doesn’t have to be always artistic. This interest to let yourself into such a process is very central: to combine, to assemble, to build up or to destroy something and to have a result in the end – this curiosity is very important.” The possibility to let oneself into such a process or the integration of such processes into a structure is also given in other disciplines. Bruemmer explains that these processes also support the feeling of self-efficacy among artists. It’s not about a status quo but rather about an ongoing advancement. “In my opinion the crucial point is the identification with what you are doing. It’s something which is quite peculiar to artists. Even if they are ambivalent about their own work and can change their attitude once they identify with their work and with what has been born out of them.”